Tag Archives: miscarriage

PRESCRIPT: Today is one of the two happiest days of my life. Max wanted a car. His mother gave him a blog instead. I am sure he will be thrilled.

At 11:51am on Wednesday October 11, 2001, my second and last son Max was born. Being the rabid All My Children Fan I was back then, I asked him to please hurry up being born so I don’t miss the episode coming on at noon. It was the last time the boy actually obeyed me unless he wanted to. Max will be 16 going on 36 today. He was born with his own compass, my Max was. He gave me a run for my money since he appeared. After eight miscarriages and the birth of my older son four years earlier, another miracle baby was hard to fathom. The previous year, I had a dermoid cyst wrapped around an ovary removed. I am known for my independence but this type of cyst is an egg that tries to become a person without the help of the male species. Two divorces later and I am thinking it wasn’t such a bad idea. I was 43 years old when I got pregnant with Max and 44 when I gave birth. I never felt my older son would be an only child. I just had no idea how a sibling would be accomplished. I was not about to go the in vitro route. I didn’t think it would help, as conception was not the problem. My miscarriages occurred at about 8 weeks each time. There was very little any doctor could do about habitual miscarriages, a few DNA tests to check our chromosome compatibility and that was about it. Marco, my older son’s life debut was an emotional roller coaster ride and I was not going to buy another ticket on that ride. I thought about adoption first and foremost as I had after so many miscarriages before Marco. I’ll tell his story when he turns 21 next April. This story belongs to Max.

I tried the adoption route again before Max. I went online, as adopting babies overseas was now all the rage in 2001. I found the most beautiful little 2 year old girl named Ana in Guatemala. She looked like me when I was little. She was so darn cute with jet -black hair and a round little face. I carried around her picture that February, fully expecting to make that call to see what adoption would entail. By early March I knew I was pregnant again. By late March I knew I was having another miscarriage. I remember the drive to the sonogram center at the local hospital so it could be done very quickly. I remember thinking on the ride over that it’s ok; don’t let your heart break again over this. Maybe we could all go to Hawaii instead. Yes, a trip to the islands, a sure fire easy trade for a baby. I remember the technician saying, “take a look at your baby, the heart’s beating fine”. I remember saying no, it isn’t. Don’t lie to me. I know what a miscarriage feels like. I am an expert. Well not this time, she said, you’re baby is fine. Fooling me is what Max has always done best. He thrives on pushing my buttons and telling me some outlandish story with the straightest face and I fall for it every time. It’s always something to get a loud rise out of me. When he did it as a six year old, I used to try and tell him the story of the Boy Who Cried Wolf. Max, however, is a natural born lawyer and always had some loophole or other thing the boy could have done to foil the wolf. Finally I gave up on this particular parable.

I had to go every few days as soon as I found out I was pregnant and have some blood work done to test if the necessary pregnancy hormones were duplicating correctly to sustain it. Max managed to even fool the doctors because the numbers stopped multiplying at one point and yet no miscarriage. That was the reason for the sonogram visit. The numbers just didn’t make sense for a viable pregnancy. That’s Max, my march to his own drummer even in vitro.

I remember thinking he was a girl. I even had the name all picked out. Marlena, Marly for short. At 44 years old, I had to have amniocentesis. They told me he was a boy, I said no he is a girl. No they told me, it’s a boy. We know what one looks like. Now I was in shock. I really was. Boy did I luck out though. I am as far from a girl mom as you can get. My boys didn’t appreciate the farting and burping when their friends were over but their friends sure got a kick out of it.

Max has an independent streak a mile wide. Some say he got it from me. I suppose. I never worried about him growing up. The penchant for calling me Maddie and his Dad, Craig, since he’s been about eight was a little hard to take at first. I was horrified but nothing would make him stop. As I often have to with Max, I give up, shake my head and just say the kid is just unparentable. Max always did things way ahead of his time. He took the training wheels off the bike at 4 and half years old. He was my motor kid. As long as it had wheels he was happy. Even in vitro, the minute the car started, he started kicking up a storm rather than being still. I don’t think he ever slept through car rides either much. So it stands to reason, he got his permit to drive at 15 and a half, the exact first second he was allowed. Max would take his friends all over the neighborhoods on those bikes of his. I never really even knew where he was half the time. Just so he came home by dark. The day he called from the mall the first time he went to tell me they are pretty sure some guy stole his friend’s new NIKE socks as they were getting ice cream and they were getting a cop to go find the guy. Max was 10 at the time. Heart stopping, I drove over there. They found the guy, not the socks though. It was the same night that two 13 year olds were stabbed sitting on a bench at the mall. Max didn’t go again for a while.

Max loves people, especially the girls. And woe is me, they like him back. He was in second grade when he announced his first girlfriend. Max is the mayor. He likes taking care of his friends and having them around. His peculiar penchant for having someone always sleep over every possible non-school night has been a bit much over the years but fun as well. Max works those sleep over guest lists like the night manager working the velvet rope at an ‘80s disco. He’s 16 today. It is difficult to see the baby grow up. He doesn’t play football anymore. Nine years of it was enough for him I guess, although I loved watching him play. As a quarterback he commanded that field. I miss my baby as you only can with the baby in the birth order, but I am also excited to see the young man he becomes. He’s got such a big heart and a great sense of humor. Max still does the “boy who cried wolf routine” with me, I still fall for it and always will I think. He keeps me on my toes and keeps me young, that’s for sure. So today I celebrate one of the two best days of my life. Happy Birthday my Max! Love, Maddie

Like this:

Before I had my sons, I had six or more miscarriages in half the amount of years. I travelled a lot for work back then. I spent a lot of time observing babies on planes. They were a source of pain and wonder back then. At times I would look at them and the high tide of hope would have me think, “I wonder when, not if, I will be a mother”. Then the times when hope would go crashing out against the horizon, the thought “I will never be a mother” was enough to require the oxygen mask to drop before me and restore my breath. Today, I see a crying baby on a plane and I just want to put it in the overhead compartment and go back to the 43 channels of inflight entertainment I don’t watch. Had I known that those babies turned into TEEENAGERS, I could have saved myself some angst. Never tell your children they are miracle babies, they grow up believing it and one doesn’t need that even if it’s true. Disclaimer- I love my sons like crazy but I digress.

I find myself as I embark on singlehoodness again for the second time in my life, doing the same observation but of couples this time. I watch now in partnerless rather than childless wonder. I had an opportunity to observe the other evening at a concert we were at. Lost in reverie, I took notes as if I could prepare the menu for a next life partner. I will leave the names out. First, because the literary advice I received tells me I should and second, it gives me plausible denial should any of them be irked by my thoughts. What are the ingredients I thought, what makes it work for some and not for others? I watched a woman dancing with a man that I thought was her husband only to find he wasn’t. A case of mistaken identity by me, nothing sinister, but what a great time those two had dancing. Is that the trick then, to find someone with so much in common and sensibilities to match that instantaneous happiness prevails? Another couple I know and admire was there on a rare occasion together at this musical event, the reason none other than each has their own preference of social events. They navigate this well and for this dancing queen, the husband never fails to get up at the end of the evening to share a few last dances with her. This touches me every time. Is this what it takes, considerate compromises? For one of my favorite couples, distance makes the heart grow fonder for sure, as they actually live in different states. Could separate dwellings be the key? Perhaps it’s just a lit bit of everything.

The odds are just as stacked against me as before, if not even more. When one leaves a marriage in their 20s or 30s, it is likely you will marry again. Whether it is happily ever after or sadly for a few, the odds are clearly in your favor either way. They were for me and it lasted a good many years. But at 60 the reality is quite different. The odds are clearly stacked against the girls. We live longer and so the ratio is in not in our favor. But we each make the choice that best fits at the best time. We can do nothing more or nothing less.

The couple that for me was love at its best and simplest is no longer a couple now. She is a widow. He passed a few weeks ago. I am honored to be going to the memorial this weekend. I never get invited to those out here. I just don’t know enough people dying. It comes from not living as an adult in the same place you grew up. My sisters back East get to attend a lot more of them, weddings too.

They sat at their own little table at every gig of our mutual musical friends. I didn’t get to know them well unfortunately, but every time I saw them, my heart tugged a bit. They emanated pure love for each other and the music I thought. They sat together, ate together, left together. Didn’t have a need to flit about the room as some do. I cannot describe this aura around them well, but I saw it often. The last few times I saw him he had oxygen with him, yet their ritual, their sharing of their love for the music, each other and the time spent together in music prevailed no matter what the physical dictated. To this observer it was the loveliest description of a marriage I ever saw. I believe I even may have the dubious distinction of being the last one shushed by him at a gig we were at for talking too loudly. If so, I am honored. May you rest in peace, dear man, a life lived in love and music is the most wondrous life lived of all.